Revisiting an older topic...blame a problem with my web browser

So I've brought up using WVCulture (West Virginia Vital Records) before. For reference, I tend to lead with the site since I have lots of records from it. Here is an example reference note:

for image here: http://archive.wvculture.org/vrr/va_view.aspx?Id=11456351&Type=Marriage

"Vital Research Records Search Selection," database and images, West Virginia Division of Arts, Culture and History (http://www.wvculture.org/vrr/ : accessed 20 Apr. 2022) > marriage search > Jordan/Belville/1859, image with header "Register of Marriages" from unidentified volume of Pleasants County marriage records, p. 6, entry 19, Jordan-Belville, 29 Nov. 1859.

(I include search terms when I use the short URL; if I happen to use the longer URL directly to the image I omit the search terms. As a side note here, I'm considering going back as I have time and using the longer, direct URL and omitting search terms. That is another story though.)

 

Now, recently I was having some issues with my browser and that led to me using a right click and "open image in new tab". Turns out, that was an interesting development. When you do that, the image does open but it has a different URL. So, same image, different URL.

The new URL is: http://images.wvculture.org/868171/00012.jpg

Turns out, the "868171" part of the URL is the GSU film number and you can edit the "00012.jpg" part of the link to directly access other images from the same film. 

For example, if I edit that URL to: http://images.wvculture.org/868171/00003.jpg what I get is the information on the filming. (Pleasants County Courthouse, 8 June 1971, "titled" Register of Marriages, 1853-1908)

Next, if I edit the URL to: http://images.wvculture.org/868171/00005.jpg what I see is an image of the spine of the book! Register of Marriages, Sept. 27, 1853 to Jan. 1, 1908, Pleasants County.

Now...this is manual instead of just clicking arrows to advance forwards and backwards as when browsing films on other sites...but, the information is present. (At least, on this film, they imaged the book spine.)

So now, based on the possibility of obtaining this data directly from the wvculture site, I'm considering changing my citations.

 

Option 1: leave the original citation format in place but add a layer, something like:

"Vital Research Records Search Selection," database and images, West Virginia Division of Arts, Culture and History (http://www.wvculture.org/vrr/ : accessed 20 Apr. 2022) > marriage search > Jordan/Belville/1859, image with header "Register of Marriages" from unidentified volume of Pleasants County marriage records, p. 6, entry 19, Jordan-Belville, 29 Nov. 1859; apparently digitized from GSU film 868171 from volume titled "Register of Marriages, Sept. 27, 1853 to Jan. 1, 1908" for Pleasants County.

 

Option 2: use newly discovered direct URL and change up the citation to name the volume

"Vital Research Records Search Selection," database and images, West Virginia Division of Arts, Culture and History (http://images.wvculture.org/868171/00012.jpg : accessed 20 Apr. 2022), image from Pleasants County, "Register of Marriages, Sept. 27, 1853 to Jan. 1, 1908", p. 6, entry 19, Jordan-Belville, 29 Nov. 1859.

 

Is either option better or worse?

 

 

Of course, my other option is to go back through all my wvculture references and lead with the documents since I can determine volume names now...

 

Submitted byEEon Mon, 04/25/2022 - 08:25

niteowl1851, I vote for Option 1. Life is too short to spend our time redoing perfectly good citations. 

That said, what a great discovery you've shared with us! 

The more-explicit URL is the one I'd likely use going forward. Yes, that would create a situation in which your working files have citations that aren't matchy-matchy. But total consistency in the citation of websites is not possible considering the diverse structures of websites and the structural changes that are (too) often made.

If you publish your work, then part of the preparation for publication would include going back to each website and verifying that each URL is still operable. That would be the time to update the citations for consistency

Submitted byniteowl1851on Mon, 04/25/2022 - 13:33

Thanks! I'm only sad that I only found this out recently. Being able to view the spine of the book directly from the wvculture page (and compare the GSU film number to FS catalog without "guessing") is awesome. I have a lot of those "unidentified volume" citations hanging around!

When you say the more-explicit URL going forward, do you mean the standard one that the site uses when you initially click on the link (http://archive.wvculture.org/vrr/va_view.aspx?Id=11456351&Type=Marriage) or do you mean the very direct link to the image that I discovered by right clicking (http://images.wvculture.org/868171/00012.jpg)?

I'm going to guess (and we'll see if I'm right) that you mean the link that ends in 00012.jpg. Not only is it shorter (yay!) but I'm guessing it is more likely to stick around unchanged. I'm guessing all the films and images that the database is built around are arranged in the same way...meaning film#/image#.

Anyway, right clicking for the win!

 

So, going forward from today, this looks OK? (Option 2 from above)

"Vital Research Records Search Selection," database and images, West Virginia Division of Arts, Culture and History (http://images.wvculture.org/868171/00012.jpg : accessed 20 Apr. 2022), image from Pleasants County, "Register of Marriages, Sept. 27, 1853 to Jan. 1, 1908", p. 6, entry 19, Jordan-Belville, 29 Nov. 1859.

with the subsequent/short looking like (depending just a little on how I layout my template fields in my program):

"Vital Research Records Search Selection," Jordan-Belville, 29 Nov. 1859.

 

 

Submitted byEEon Mon, 04/25/2022 - 19:09

Yes, niteowl. By more explicit, I was referencing the "very direct" link that identifies the microfilm number and the image number.  

Submitted byniteowl1851on Tue, 04/26/2022 - 13:47

Yay! that is what I was assuming.

I don't think the little trick I found is browser specific, but just in case, this was all in firefox.